Chapter 14
DAWN
Iwoke up pressed tightly to Talbot’s chest and felt a little suffocated. I quickly realized that it was because at some point in my sleep, I’d burrowed beneath his T-shirt like a groundhog and was nestled between his pecs.
To my left, his nipple perked up like it wanted attention. I had the completely scandalous urge to nip it between my teeth. Instead, I managed to wiggle out of his shirt, the soft hair of his chest scraping against my sweat damp cheek.
My face was flushed bright red when I emerged, straddling Talbot’s wide thighs and looking up at his laughing eyes.
“Good morning.” His voice was hoarse and low from disuse, and it did something to me.
A desire that I’d rarely felt lit up my insides, and he rumbled low in his chest. I scrambled off his body.
This wasn’t something I could do right now.
I needed to sort out everything with Vance and my old pack.
I couldn’t… I had a fated mate now. Even if I hadn’t accepted him, it was ordained, right?
I couldn’t reject him. That was like spitting in the goddess’s face.
Talbot frowned, shaking his head. “I wish I could hear what was going on in your mind.”
He really didn’t. Sometimes the inside of my head, especially when I felt overwhelmed, was a dark place to be. I cleared my throat. “I should go back to my room.”
Talbot almost hid the flash of rejection on his face.
If I’d been a normal woman, I would have missed it completely, but I wasn’t normal, and in the face of his hurt, my Omega abilities reared to the surface at the speed of light.
I moved to the side of the bed and leaned down, kissing his cheek softly.
“Thank you for protecting me while I slept.”
We were more human than we’d like to accept, but some innate animalistic habits still crept in, like not fully sleeping when you were by yourself… or maybe that was just me because I’d never had a safe place to sleep.
Talbot cupped my cheek, turning my face so his lips could brush mine. “Every night until the end of time, if you’ll let me.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and tore my eyes from his, then I straightened my clothes and gave him a tight smile as I backed out of his room. I needed a moment—a long series of moments in fact. I moved down the silent hall, and I realized it was really late. How long had I slept?
I stepped into the bathroom across the hall from my room and looked around the large area.
The shower stall could have held an entire football team, or maybe like, three bears.
I felt stronger today. The hits I took yesterday were more emotional than physical, and resting with Talbot had helped as well.
I turned on the shower and shed my clothes, hanging them on the hook outside the cubicle. I ran the water until it was so hot that it would scorch a normal person. I liked baths well enough, but I preferred the feeling of the water washing away my sins. It helped me think.
I examined my feelings. When I’d run, I’d run straight to these guys. I couldn’t rationalize the pull I felt toward them as anything but visceral. Despite what I’d told them, there had been other options for me. Even other wolf packs who would have taken me in.
There was a group in the city who took in stray supernaturals—Eden or something—and other places to go, but my wolf knew where we should be, and she’d taken my bleeding, brutalized body to what she considered the safest place for us—toward her fated mate.
Even if human me had been completely oblivious.
My hair was still clean from yesterday, but I put it under the water anyway.
It was warm and slightly earthy smelling water, and Franklin had said it was funneled in from an underground hot spring.
I stood there for a long time, and I let tears stream down my face, happy for once that my weakness was not on show for anyone else.
I grieved. I grieved for the children I’d lost and the ones I’d never have. I grieved for the person I could have been, a mate worthy of the Alpha of the Cold River Sleuth.
I gave myself over to the desolation until the door opened. I froze, until the scent of Vance permeated the bathroom. I remained tense, but not because I was scared. No, it was for a far more cowardly reason than that.
“Omega?”
I should turn off the water and give him the attention he deserved, but instead, I hid. “Apologies, Alpha, for hogging the shower.”
Dammit, my voice sounded rough.
“That’s not why I’m here, Dawn. We needed to talk anyway, and the scent of your distress riles my bear. I want to make it better for you.”
Goddess. Of course my mate would be able to sense my tears. “I’m sorry.”
I felt as well as heard his sigh. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I should apologize. I’ve fucked this up so badly.
” I heard him sit down on the toilet lid, the plastic groaning under his considerable size.
“Franklin and I are fine. We’ve been friends for our entire lives, and I love him like he is my own kin.
Talbot too. So I don’t want you to think I’d ever do anything to hurt him, as a man or an Alpha.
” There was a long, pregnant pause, like he was waiting for me to add something, but words vacated my brain right now.
“I want you to know that just because you’re my fated mate, you aren’t obligated to do anything or be anything.
I’d like us to be friends, but that’s all. ”
“You don’t want me?”
He groaned. “I want you more than you can even imagine, but what I want means nothing right now. It’s all about you.
” More creaking, like he was shifting around.
“If you want the twins, then I’m okay with that too.
Ecstatic even. There’s no one else I’d want for you than the two men I trust with my life and the lives of everyone in my sleuth. ”
This conversation was somehow easier when he wasn’t looking at me. I was honest enough with myself that I knew I wanted Talbot and Franklin. I wanted them to be mine, as did my wolf, but she whined at the thought of never having Vance too.
“And if I want you as well?”
There was nothing but silence. Stupid of me. He was an Alpha. He didn’t share his lovers with anyone.
“Is that what you want, Dawn? Do you want me and my betas?” His voice was on the other side of the shower curtain now, and I could see the opaque outline of his body.
I closed my eyes. “It’s greedy. You are the most powerful bears in your den. Stealing all of you from the females would be incredibly selfish, especially if I can’t give you cubs.” I choked on those last words like they were poison.
“But you want me?” He sounded uncertain, and it was kind of endearing. I closed my eyes and let myself be greedy for a moment. Even though I barely knew him, he spoke to my soul like a siren.
“Yes.”
A hand reached through the curtain and just hung there—an offering, or maybe we were shaking on a deal.
I lifted my hand and placed my palm in his.
“I won’t rest until you have everything you want in life, Dawn.
I’m going to make you so deliriously happy that you’ll wake up every morning with a smile on your face, and everything before this moment will just be a bad memory you’ve overcome with strength and grace. ”
I could see why this bear was an Alpha. Even as he said the words, the reassurance that pulsed down the connection between us wrapped me up like a blanket of strength.
I believed him. Lifting my hand, he raised it to his lips, his fingers brushing lightly across my knuckles.
I was still hiding behind the shower curtain, but I could see the outline of his head, and in the small gap, I saw the shape of his lips on my skin.
My body clenched, and desire swelled in a way I’d rarely felt in my life—with Talbot before, and with the twins back when I was a teen.
Even then, it wasn’t like this, as if my brain was running away with me, imagining the different places those lips could touch me.
Vance cleared his throat roughly, and I realized he could probably scent my desire—shifter noses. He massaged between my thumb and forefinger gently before dropping my hand behind the shower curtain.
“I’ll leave you to your shower. Take your time. The water is pumped from hot springs beneath the mountain.” He moved away silently. “I’m so glad you’re here, Dawn. I hate how you got here, but you’re where you’re supposed to be now.”
I heard the soft rustle of the door opening before the gentle thud of it closing told me I was once again alone. Gripping my hand to my chest, I stroked the place that still felt warm from his kiss.